[kingcrow]

Hi, I have to create a program that generates an array of random characters. The program then prints how many times each character occurs. So far I have been able to generate the random characters but I have no idea how to count each character's occurrence. Any help is greatly appreciated. Here is my code so far,

#include <iostream>
#include <cstdlib>

using namespace std;

void getInput (int& seed, int& numChar);
void charGen (int currentNumChar, int numChar, char alpha [52]);

int main(){
int seed, numChar, currentNumChar;
char alpha [52] = {'A', 'B', 'C', 'D', 'E', 'F', 'G', 'H', 'I', 'J', 'K', 'L', 'M', 'N', 'O', 'P',
				   'Q', 'R', 'S' ,'T' ,'U', 'V', 'W', 'X', 'Y', 'Z','a', 'b', 'c', 'd', 'e', 'f', 
				   'g', 'h', 'i', 'j', 'k', 'l', 'm', 'n', 'o', 'p', 'q', 'r', 's', 't', 'u', 'v',
				    'w', 'x', 'y', 'z'};
				    
getInput (seed, numChar);	
srand (seed);	
charGen (currentNumChar, numChar, alpha);

cout<<endl<<"Summary for the characters: "<<endl<<endl;

system("pause");		
return 0;
}

void getInput (int& seed, int& numChar){
	cout<<"Enter a seed number: ";
	 cin>>seed;
	 cout<<"Number of characters: ";
	 cin>>numChar;
   	cout<<endl<<numChar<<" characters generated:"<<endl<<endl;	
}
void charGen (int currentNumChar, int numChar, char alpha [52]){
for (currentNumChar = 1; currentNumChar <= numChar; currentNumChar++){
	if (currentNumChar < numChar)
		cout<<alpha [rand()%53];
	else 						   
		cout<<alpha [rand()%53]<<endl;											  
											  }	
}

[JackOfAllTrades]

Maybe this blog entry might give you some ideas.

[Midi_]

well man since you have a fixed number of characters you could create a separate function, maybe call it something like "charTracker();" and every time your random number generator chooses a letter it sends that character into the tracker. In the tracker you can make a 26 line switch case, put upper and lowercase in each character with an if statement to decide if its upper or lower, then have it assign the value to that char (etc.A=A+1;) etc for each character. Then youll need to make a separate function that will print out all of the characters. Its alot of hard coding,but it will work

This post has been edited by Midi_: 23 March 2013 - 04:27 PM

[kingcrow]

JackOfAllTrades, on 23 March 2013 - 04:24 PM, said:

Maybe this blog entry might give you some ideas.

The blog entry that you linked is very helpful, thank you.

Midi_, on 23 March 2013 - 04:27 PM, said:

well man since you have a fixed number of characters you could create a separate function, maybe call it something like "charTracker();" and every time your random number generator chooses a letter it sends that character into the tracker. In the tracker you can make a 26 line switch case, put upper and lowercase in each character with an if statement to decide if its upper or lower, then have it assign the value to that char (etc.A=A+1;) etc for each character. Then youll need to make a separate function that will print out all of the characters. Its alot of hard coding,but it will work

Thank you for your suggestion.

[Adak]

Midi_, on 23 March 2013 - 04:27 PM, said:

well man since you have a fixed number of characters you could create a separate function, maybe call it something like "charTracker();" and every time your random number generator chooses a letter it sends that character into the tracker. In the tracker you can make a 26 line switch case, put upper and lowercase in each character with an if statement to decide if its upper or lower, then have it assign the value to that char (etc.A=A+1;) etc for each character. Then youll need to make a separate function that will print out all of the characters. Its alot of hard coding,but it will work

Ouch!

Think of the letter as an ascii number (which they are), and then as that number, as an index to an array.

Along the lines of:

   int frequncyCounter[SIZE]={0}; //All elements set to zero
   frequencyCounter[asciiValueOfLetter]++;

Won't work with huge numbers, but for smaller numbers and all letters, it's great.

[jjl]

Expanding on what Adak said, each ascii character as a decimal representation (Ascii Table). Knowing this, you can create an array which covers the scope of all ascii characters (0 - 127).

int charFreq[127];

Iterate over the random input characters, and increment the charFreq array at the index of the input character.Once you do this for every character in the input, the charFreq array will have the frequency of each letter at each index.

i.e.

get input

for each char in input
   charFreq[input[i]] += 1;